Your Right to Know

There will be no voter referendum on House Bill 319, but Democrats are hoping voters will still
get to judge Ohio’s Republican-leaning congressional map.

Republican Secretary of State Jon Husted rejected today the approximately 1,700 signatures
Democrats collected to seek a referendum on House Bill 319 — which contains the boundaries for the
state’s 16 congressional districts.

Husted said he rejected the signatures because the bill also contained an appropriation — a
$2.75 million stipend to help counties implement the new district lines that served the dual
purpose of exempting the bill from referendum.

Democrats expected the ruling but feel it only helps them in their lawsuit filed in the Ohio
Supreme Court to make the map component of the bill subject to a referendum.

“It’s not Jon Husted who did this, it’s the Republican hypocrites in the legislature who did
this,” said Chris Redfern, chairman of the Ohio Democratic Party.

Redfern said the party collected the required 1,000 signatures for certification — the first
step to trigger a referendum — on the advice of legal counsel as a means to boost the party’s
lawsuit. He said the party collected most of the signatures in about four hours.

The Democratic group Ohioans for Fair Elections filed a lawsuit to halt the bill’s
implementation by allowing a referendum on the map in 2012. Evidence, briefs, and replies are due
this week.

“It gives further merit to our case,” Redfern said.

Ohio lost two congressional seats based on population losses counted in the 2010 Census. A
perk of the huge electoral victories Republicans enjoyed in 2010 was the reward of getting to
redraw Ohio’s congressional map to their liking.

According to the Ohio Campaign for Accountable Redistricting, 12 of the districts lean
Republican and four lean toward Democrats.

Husted consulted with in-house counsel before making the ruling, spokesman Matt McClellan
said.